


Shaky Hands

by noalarmsandnosuprises



Series: whumptober 2019 [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Medical Inaccuracies, Whumptober, i don’t know shit about injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-11-15 07:47:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20862716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noalarmsandnosuprises/pseuds/noalarmsandnosuprises
Summary: hi i don’t know shit about injuries





	Shaky Hands

**Author's Note:**

> hi i don’t know shit about injuries

Being back in the suit was amazing. Mr Stark had given it back a few weeks ago, inside a paper bag with his initials on the outside and, get this, his own  personal  phone number on the inside, which had proved quite handy when May found out, yelling and screaming - “My son - out my  boy  in motherf- Germany! With the  Avengers!  With  soldiers!” - and demanding to speak to Tony. After that ordeal, to Peter’s surprise, his message inbox was normally never without a message. 

_You back from saving cats yet, Spider-Menace?_ Today’s text was right on time, standing out amongst their previous conversation full of spelling errors and memes. 

_not yet_,  Peter replied from the top of a building, legs swinging gayly.  _finished my homework before i leftso i’m gonna stay out a few more hours. that okay?_

_Fine with me. Just make sure you tell Aunt Hottie. I almost went deaf after that screaming session. _

Peter laughed. They’d come a long way since homecoming. Tony joked about what a little shit he was, but he still invited him over every Friday night.

_already told her,_ he texted back. _see u tomorrow, mr stank._

_Smell you later, Sticky Fingers. I have to go and pay a certain James Rhodes a visit _

He shoved his phone in the pocket of his skin-tight suit and stood up, joints popping as he stretched. This suit really was so much better than his old one. The webshooter combinations, Karen - it was easily the most amazing thing Peter had ever owned, and he was determined to make the most of it.  Before Mr Stark takes it away again when you inevitably mess up again , he didn’t think.

“Peter,” Karen said as he flipped off the building to get rid of the thought, “There’s activity three blocks from here. I’ve plotted out a possible one-minute route to the destination.”

Peter cocked his head, listening hard. He could hear, in the distance, yells and bangs. “Thanks, Karen.”

“No problem, Peter.”

He followed the red lines materialising across his vision, web-slinging across the mostly deserted streets. 

“I swear, I’ll get the money, I have a shipment coming in and as soon as it sells - “

“This is the third time we’ve landed you money. I need the money buy tomorrow,” The hooded guy said, “Same time, same place. Otherwise,” He loaded his pistol. 

“Please,” Peter heard him stutter and crept closer, crawling down the side of the empty bar face-first, “I’ve got a daughter and a baby on the way, I have to feed them. Gimme another chance, Dan,  please -  “

Dan shoved his weapon up against the smaller man’s temple. Peter flinched and scooted closer. His fingers hovered at his web-shooters. 

“These are  my  wages Boss is giving you. My shares. I ain’t gonna get those back unless you -“ He prodded the man’s chest with the gun - “Hand the money over. I’ve got my own family to think about. Me and my boys, I mean, who are less accepting of this situation than I am.” He moved the gun toward the man’s shoulder, pressed the barrel in deep, and pulled the trigger. 

It was if someone pulled a switch. The man doubled back, staggering in the alley, his sandy hair turning brown, his thin face morphing into one similar to Peter’s own. The bullet ripped cleanly through the man’s shoulder and his hands flew up, a scream dribbling down his chin. His hoodie shifted into a Yankees jersey, maroon stain moving from the shoulder to the dead middle. 

“Ben?” Peter toppled off of the wall, fingers unsticking. “Oh, god - Ben, why’d you do that - I could of - I -“

“Spider-Man,” Ben breathed, tears pooling in his eyes, “What - what are you talking about?”

“W-what?” Peter choked out. His suit was smothering him, his mask strangling him. 

“You scared, Spidey?” A new voice joined the conversation. Dan was still holding the gun, the barrel now exhaling thin trail of smoke. All Peter could see was Ben bleeding out in his hands. He could smell the blood, taste the gunpowder, hear the shot and Ben’s gasps, heat his heartbeat stopping. 

Peter screamed, a mixture between a yell and a sob, and dove towards Dan, shooting a web at his face. The attacker clawed at it, yelling back.

“You little shit!” He hit at Peter with his fist, but he was trembling. 

“You did a bad thing, Mr. Dan the Criminal Man!” Peter double-tapped his web-shooter with his index and ring fingers. The familiar  thwip  of a web sticking Dan to the street light behind him mingled with his uncle’s quieter cries. He shot another, wrapping his left side of the body to the pole almost as if the gang member were a kebab. He aimed for another, and - 

“Watch out, Spider-Man!” 

The bullet tore through the air faster than anticipated. His Spidey-Sense  screamed , drowned out all other sounds, but Peter was in slow-motion, his movements almost waterlogged by seeing Ben like that again. He turned. Not fast enough. 

“Oh,” Peter said. Across his chest, a blossoming stain was leaking through his suit, coating his fingertips as his hands instinctively came up to cradle the wound. “Oh.”

“Not so super now,” Dan taunted. 

“Bye,” Peter breathed out, one last web flying from his right hand, wrapping the criminal to the pole, “Bye, Mr. Criminal.”

Adrenaline washed away quicker than the blood flowed, and pain replaced it just as fast. Peter had never been shot before - broken bones? Definitely. Stabbed? Maybe once or twice, but never shot. He hadn’t really come into contact with that much gun violence, and when he did he usually webbed it up as soon as possibly. 

“Mr. Stark’s gonna kill me,” He whispered, hands pressing into his chest, stumbling out of the street. 

“Mr. Stark is not going to kill you, Peter, but that bullet might,” Karen said. “Calling Tony Stark.”

“No!” He cried, wincing. “Karen, y-you can’t, he’ll take away the suit again.” 

“I don’t think he will, Peter,” His AI said slowly. Black spots had begun to creep into his line of vision. Peter blinked, but his eyelids weighted tonnes and he had to strain to open them again.

“He’s gonna,” He said, voice beginning to slur, “Cause I messed...I messed up.”

“Calling Tony Stark,” Karen said again, firmer and more decisive. This time, Peter didn’t object. He showed no sign of hearing her voice, instead looking down at the wound with bleary eyes. The bloodstain had soaked the fabric of his torso and gloves, right up to his wrists. His feet, too, were red, a darker red than his suit; Peter had been dripping blood on the concrete ground for a few minutes now. It pooled around his toes, sticky and thick, and slowly, his eyes fluttered closed.

“Go’n to sleep, Kar’n,” He said, and promptly keeled over.

-

Tony Stark did not like this kid. He didn’t not like this kid one bit, he did not like him Sam-I-Am. 

He tried to tell himself that. Convinced himself the kid was an annoying little asshole. So he stayed away from him, let Happy take his calls. And that worked. For a while. Until Peter took down a hijacked plane in a onesie and webbed up a weapons dealer could have turned out to be an Avengers-Level threat. 

Now Tony could thought otherwise. Peter was starting to grow on him, slowly but surely, like a foot fungus. Tony just wanted Peter to turn out better than he did, wanted him to still be a kid, get good grades and do good things while he still could. Somehow that had morphed into letting the kid come over for Lab days and teaching him how to fix the suit and then Karen and write code. 

“And what does he do in return?” Tony said out aloud, picking up a piece of paper. “Leaves his god damn chemistry homework here.” 

He turned it over, expecting it to be completed - after all, he had texted earlier saying it was done - and surprise, surprise: found it was void of any answers. 

“Friday,” He said, looking closer as if Peter had written the answers in invisible ink, “Call Peter, would you?”

“Calling Peter,” Friday replied. Tony sunk into the couch, chuckling.  May’s gonna kill him.  “Peter is not answering his phone.”

“What?” Tony frowned. “Aren’t kid’s supposed to be glued to their phones or something? Friday, what the hell?”

“Don’t shoot the messenger,” She shot back, artificial voice carrying a tone of anger. “Wait, hang on, Boss - I’m getting a call from Karen.”

“Who?”

“Peter’s AI, Boss,” Friday said. 

“Jesus, did he name her after Plankton’s wife? This kid, I swear to god...put her through,” Tony shook his head. 

“Mr Stark,” Karen said, her voice echoing down from the ceiling just as Friday’s had. 

“What’ve you got for me, Karen? Peter run off to join the circus ‘cos I found out he was lying?”

“No, Mr Stark,” She said. “Peter doesn’t know about the homework.”

“Well, why are you calling?” He stood up from the couch, twirling the paper in his hands. 

“Peter is currently bleeding out in an alleyway after sustaining a gunshot wound to the chest.”

Tony stopped. Peter’s chemistry homework fluttered from his hand and floated toward the floor. 

“Boss?” Said Friday.

“Call a suit, Fri,” He said numbly. He could feel his heart rate picking up. “Karen, why the fuck didn’t you lead with that?”

-

Tony had never felt more useless. Well, maybe not, but this level of uselessness ranked pretty darn high. He was flying as fast as his suit could go, faster than Friday had suggested he did but he was still one and a half minutes out. Time was ticking - it had taken Tony eight minutes and thirty-four seconds to get this far - and the longer he took to get to Peter the greater injury Spider-Man sustained. 

“Fucking dumbass suit,” He swore, zooming over the dark topography of Queens. “Go faster.”

“I’m trying, Boss,” Friday snarked back. She was the one driving, not him. Friday was programmed to know the fastest routes; he barely knew how to get to the Stark tower he still hadn’t sold from the empty compound. 

Friday slowed the thrusters as they approved their destination, swivelling the Iron Man suit into a landing position. “Landing in three, Boss.”

“Good work, Fri,” He praised, stepping out of the machinery and promptly gagging. 

A small silhouette was curled on the floor in front of him, one arm splayed out, fingers twitching, the other under the body. Peter’s masked head was lying in a pool of - holy fuck - his own blood. 

“Pete?” He breathed, crossing the distance between them in one stride and dropping to his knees, not caring about the concrete scuffing the knees of his quarter of a million dollar pants. “Pete? Hey, Sticky Fingers, you home?”

With gentle fingers he peeled back Peter’s mask and dropped it next to him. His left eye fluttered open feebly and then closed. 

“Hey, kiddo,” Tony was going to have a heart attack. He was not equipped for this. Nope. Nada. “It’s Tony.”

At this, Peter opened his eyes again. He blinked once and let out a guttural moan. 

“I’m not that ugly, am I?,” Tony asked. He had absolutely zero medical training, but he doubted this reaction from Peter was good.“Friday, what do I do?” 

“Keep him awake, Boss. There’s not much you can do for Peter; he’s enhanced. I’ve called Helen Cho. She’s currently flying over from Korea, but she’s sent someone who’ll be here in ten minutes approximately. All you can do is keep him awake while you wait.”

Tony let out a string of curse words that would give Captain America an aneurysm and poked at Peter. Kids were a different species, sue him. 

“Hey, kid? Can you sit up, please?” He said, voice definitely not quavering in the least. 

Peter flinched away from his touch and blinked again. “‘M St’r?” 

Praise the lord. “Hey, Underoos. Do you reckon you can sit up for me?”

Peter shifted but didn’t budge from his facedown position on the road. “Nnn.”

“I have to do everything myself, don’t I?” Tony shook his head. He hooked his hands underneath Peter’s arms, tried to ignore the substance leaking onto his hands, and lifted the kid up into a sitting position. 

“Oh, shit.”

There was a literal gaping  hole  in Peter’s chest. A bullet wound framed by too much blood, blood that stained all of his chest, matted in his hair and smeared across his cheek. Tony wanted to sprint, to run away and let someone else deal with it, but something - possibly  shock,  because holy shit -kept him rooted to the spot. 

“Friday?”

“Sending stats to Helen Cho now. Put pressure on the wound, Boss.”

Peter let out a groan again, attempted to lift his hand and failed miserably. “S’rry.”

“What the hell are you sorry for?” Tony asked, incredulous, moving his hands toward Peter’s. His heart rate was through the roof, blood rushing dangerously in his ears. Under the scars of the Arc Reactor that had once been in his body Tony felt his chest cave in, thousand-dollar blazer tighten, breath quicken. He held his hands out in front of him, but they were shaking like a leaf. 

“G’ttin,” Peter slurred, voice a little quieter. He took a deep breath. “G’ttin shot.”

“You’re sorry for getting shot?” He whispered, trying to still his trembling hands for one moment. They jittered in the air above Peter’s chest. He was going to fuck this up. Just like he fucked up the Accords. Just like he fucked up his and Steve’s friendship, his parent’s relationship, his and Pepper’s relationship. He couldn’t do this. 

“Boss, you need to breathe,” Said Friday at the exact same time Peter’s tiny voice asked, “‘M St’r?” 

“Yeah, sorry - sorry kiddo.” He took a deep breath, shut his eyes and pressed down on the wound. 

“You a’gry?” Peter mumbled. Tony opened one eye. 

“No - ‘course not,” Tony’s eyebrows furrowed. “Why would I be angry?”

“‘Cos,” Peter coughed, “Got shot. Y’u g’nna take aw’y my suit?”

Tony’s jaw went slack. If possible, he thought his hands shook even more. Taking away the kid’s suit wasn’t a smart decision. He knew it when he did it, he knew it while watching Peter live on the news in his onesie, knew it when he wrapped it up in a brown paper bag. He wasn’t the kid’s father, but he was his mentor, and so far he had done a damn shit job. You’re just like Howard. You’re no different. 

“Boss, the ambulance will be arriving in approximately two minutes.” 

Tony exhaled shakily, nodding. Peter’s wound had stopped spurting blood - good or bad sign he had no idea. The sooner Cho’s friends were arriving, the better. 

“I’m - I’m never gonna take away your suit again, okay?” He stuttered. Somewhere in the distance sirens rang out. Tony leaned closer to Peter, eyes tracking his shallow, tiny breaths underneath his still-shaking fingers. “I’m so sorry - I’ll - never again, okay?”

“O’ay,” Peter said. As if that piece of information was all he needed, his eyelids shut and his head dropped toward his chest. He shifted towards Tony, his hand shifting to grab the man’s jacket sleeve. 

“Hey, no sleeping on my watch, Peter,” Tony managed, corners of his mouth twitching downward. “Stay awake, okay? Help’s coming.”

“D’nt need help,” Said Peter, head lolling onto Tony’s shoulder. “You’re here.” 

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys thought i might try whumptober i didn’t even know what a whump was prior to today so this is probably definitely not my best work. i’m not going to be doing one everyday, because i’m not that talented and time-aware, so i’ll probably just post a few. thanks for reading!


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